My lowest weight in years.

Today, for the first time in many years, I weigh less than 450 pounds. 448 to be precise (with shoes on and things in my pocket). This tells me I must be doing something right. My weight has hovered between 450 and 460 for the last almost 2 years. Weight loss completely stopped about 6 months after I had my surgery. Didn't go up, that's good, but stopped going down as well. I never experienced the level of "restriction" most people do after surgery. I have been able to eat far more than I thought I should, though it's certainly far less than before surgery. So I guess maybe these daily trips to the gym are useful after all. That does help with the motivation, to see a tangible result. 

I'm struggling with "burnout" and trying to figure out new and interesting things to do while at the gym. I know that if I keep up the same routine I'll not only stop seeing any improvement, I'll get frustrated and tired of going. Can't let that happen. Fighting the depression and getting out of the house is hard enough without the extra burden of of burnout. I need to keep it fun and interesting. So, I search for new, interesting exercises, and the internet provides.  Oh boy does it provide. There are so many conflicting opinions that it's hard to know what is worth reading and what is junk. I figure if multiple sources say the same thing about the same thing then maybe it's legitimate. 

My weekly regime consists of a couple daily exercised and more that I do on a rotating schedule of sorts. One of my least favorite, but one I find quite effective, is the "glute bridge". Here's how you do them. 

• Bend your knees and put your feet flat on the ground just close enough that you can graze your heels with your fingertips when you stretch your arms down by your side. Your feet should be about hip-width apart.
• Bend your elbows to 90 degrees so that only your upper arm is on the ground.
• Then drive up through your heels and upper back to lift your glutes off the ground. Drive your hips up as high as possible, squeezing the glutes hard. Keep your belly button drawn in so you don’t hyperextend your back.
• Do not push backward off your heels. Make sure you are driving straight up and that your knees aren’t caving in.
• Squeeze your glutes for second or two at the top and lower all the way back down to the ground before repeating.
• You should feel this move in your glutes and hamstrings and not in your low back.
• Do not rush through glute bridges. Take time to hold at the top and feel the glutes activate.

I like the glute bridge because it doesn't require any equipment. And sometimes it's nice to lay on the floor for a while. And they work. 

One of my other favorites is the Tricep Pushdown using a cable. I like these because there are so many different ways to do the same exercise. You can use a straight bar, rope, the inverted V handles or pretty much any other bar that allows you to pull the cable down. 

• Face high pulley and grasp cable attachment with narrow overhand grip. Position elbows to side.
• Extend arms down. Return until forearm is close to upper arm. Repeat.
• The elbow can travel up slightly at top of motion. Stay close to cable to provide resistance at top of motion.

Of course there are far, far more exercises to do, and I intend to experiment with many of them in order to find what works for me, but also to give myself a variety of options to choose from. I have to keep it interesting so I keep doing it. If I'm sweating then I'm doing something right, as long as I don't hurt myself. I've learned a couple things over the last two months. 

• Every day, do something. Even if you can't make it to the gym, do something. 
• Attitude makes all the difference. If I go to the gym in a bad mood I stay in a bad mood and my workout suffers for it. If I go in feeling unmotivated, my workout suffers for it. 
• I need to make it fun. Keep it interesting. If it's not fun I don't like doing it. If I don't like doing it, see above. 
• You really need to listen to your body. There is a difference between "good" pain and "something is wrong" pain. 
• Keeping track really can help motivate you. When you lift more, or go further or weigh less, it keeps you going. 
• I really have no idea what the hell I'm doing. But I'm learning. 

Technical difficulties

Apparently the links I have posted to my ramblings have been experiencing a redirect issue. I was unaware of that, but it's been taken care of. Apparently some of the Blogger widgets can experience problems, I just happened to be using one. No longer. This is one of the issues with internet technology, you don't know it's broken until someone tells you it's broken.

Moti....Motivat...ahh crap

So I've been going to the gym 5 or 6 days a week for two months now. I make myself go and usually once I'm there I get into it. Today, not so much. I went. That I did. Did some cardio, wandered through the weight room, and went and sat in the hot tub. I just couldn't do it. It's not so much that I didn't want to do, I simply couldn't. And I don't like that feeling. I'm not sure what's causing it. Burn out perhaps. Boredom.

I remind myself every day that I feel better than I have in years. I remind myself how miserable I was when the scale was bouncing off 600 pounds. When clothing didn't fit, when I couldn't walk to the end of the driveway without being out of breath. But some days it's just not enough. Some days I want to go find the biggest, greasiest, nastiest hamburger I can, eat it all and chase it with a gallon of beer. Today has been one of those days. My depression creeps out of hiding and fills my head with useless thoughts, with self doubt, with other, darker thoughts. It reminds me of why I started working out and I know that, tomorrow, I will be back at the gym and I will sweat, I will lift, I will feel better. But today it's just not happening. Today my body is rebelling. My mind is rebelling. My motivation is hiding. I need to find it again, before it escapes altogether and I slide back into that despicable hole of depression I've worked so hard to climb out of. But how? How do I keep my motivation? That has been a lifelong struggle for me. The motivation, the drive, the ambition that so many others have, I lack. My brain seems incapable of those things.

I found this photo while doing a Google search on "how to stay motivated". Apparently it's a common problem as there are literally thousands of articles dedicated to it.

Oddly, what I can't find is a list of 50 reasons to NOT exercise. I know this. I think we all know this. You feel better when you exercise. You look better when you exercise. You think better when you exercise. So why is it so damn hard to exercise? I think one problem is that I'm bored. I've developed a rut, a routine, a pattern, and it's been the same every day. I need to change that. 

In reading some of the thousands of motivation articles I keep seeing the same key points over and over again. One being VARIETY. This seems lacking in my daily routine. I need to mix it up. After a certain period of doing the same workouts over and over again, your body will adapt to the routine and hit a plateau. Try to avoid this by basically throwing your body off-balance and keeping it from getting used to a certain routine. Mix in low-intensity days with high-intensity ones. Look online or around the gym for new exercises to try. Now, for right now exercise classes just aint gonna happen. I've watched them through the door on a few occasions and lets just say I know my current limits. So that leaves me with free weights, machines and cardio to play with. I need to come up with some new ideas. Thankfully the interwebs are chock full of new ideas.

Apparently I should also set goals. Or so all these articles are telling me. I suppose they should be more tangible than "be less fat". Small steps. It's easier to implement a behavior and lifestyle change by doing it one step at a time. I need attainable goals that are realistic for my body and the fact that, for the most part I've spent the last decade on my ass wallowing in self pity and whatever food I could get my hands on. They say that it's a good idea to write down your goals in a log or journal and make new ones once those are reached. Hmm, does a blog that no one reads count?

Music. I don't know about you, but music motivates me. It wakes me up, it affects my mood, it gives me energy or relaxes me. It seems that a good playlist is very important to a productive visit to the gym. Mine needs some serious work. I'm stuck in a music rut. I need to find some songs that get me moving instead of putting me to sleep. I really really think that would help. I just need to spend some time finding those songs. And downloading them, then uploading them. I need to get on that. What's on your playlist?

Weight training to lose weight?

I know, you don't hear that very often. It seems everyone is all about cardio, cardio and more cardio. Every weight loss article is about some new fad diet or walking, or some new, nifty "color run" or some such nonsense. When you read about weight lifting it's "bulk" and "steroids". It's pictures of swollen men with obscene amounts of muscle. Weightlifting is rarely mentioned in the "weight loss" conversation. It really should be. Though there is one caveat, you won't necessarily lose weight. In fact, you may gain some. This is one reason that the scale is a horrible thing to worry about. What you will lose is inches. You will lose flab. And you'll feel a lot better too. 

Harvard School of Public Health conducted a 12 year study on exercise and weight loss. Their findings are published in the journal Obesity. 10,500 healthy men aged 40 and over participated in the study from 1996 to 2008. They compared a 20 minute weight training workout to a moderate to vigorous aerobic exercise. They found that weight training garnered far better weight loss. This has much to do with the fact that weightlifting boosts your metabolic rate over the short term AND the long term. It causes something called excess post-exercise oxygen consumption, or EPOC. Much like the cooling of a motor after a long trip, your body also needs to cool. While is does it consumes oxygen. EPOC is the amount of oxygen required to restore your body to its normal, resting level of metabolic function (called homeostasis). It also explains how your body can continue to burn calories long after you've finished your workout.

In an extensive review of the research literature on EPOC, Bersheim and Bahr (2003) concluded that “studies in which similar estimated energy cost or similar exercising VO2 have been used to equate continuous aerobic exercise and intermittent resistance exercise, have indicated that resistance exercise produces a greater EPOC response.” For example, one study found that when aerobic cycling (40 minutes at 80 percent Max HR), circuit weight training (4 sets/8 exercises/15 reps at 50 percent 1-RM) and heavy resistance exercise (3 sets/8 exercises at 80-90 percent 1-RM to exhaustion) were compared, heavy resistance exercise produced the biggest EPOC.

So all that walking, running and other cardio is good for you, but if you're trying to lose fat, lift heavy things repeatedly. After a weightlifting session you will experience an increase in metabolic rate. That means you'll burn more calories faster. Weightlifting will help you maintain your total amount of lean muscle mass, creating a permanent increase in metabolism. Lean muscle mass requires the body to burn calories simply to maintain it. Fat just sits. Cardio training will only cause a short rise in metabolic rate for an hour or two after the session, taking away from the overall calorie-burning benefits compared with resistance training. Cardio is still a good thing and makes for a fabulous warm-up before lifting. It can take 10 minutes to be able to efficiently use aerobic metabolism to produce ATP (the fuel your body uses for muscular activity). necessary to sustain physical movement. Once you get pumped (or sweaty) the aerobic energy pathways provide most of the ATP you need.

One additional bonus to weightlifting is that it will change your body composition. Aerobic exercise with burn calories and help you drop weight, but it doesn't build much lean body mass. It will reveal what you already have, but not add much to it. And remember, it's the lean body mass that burns calories. Muscles. And it is possible to combine the two through the application of High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). You get the best of both worlds, and you ass kicked. HIIT is intervals of high-intensity exercise like running, or crunches, or light weight, high repetition lifting, followed by low intensity or complete rest. HIIT has been scientifically proven to burn weight faster than steady-state cardio. Weightlifting is, by itself, a form of HIIT. The only requirement is to keep the "rest period" between sets as short as possible. 

So, if you lift weights and keep the rest periods short, you're doing High-Intensity Interval Training. HIIT causes EPOC, EPOC continues to burn calories long after the session is over. It also changes your body composition, adding lean body mass. Lean body mass burns calories, while fat does not. You'll look better, feel better and burn fat faster. It's a good thing.

I have been working out 5 days a week now for two months. I start with 15 minutes of cardio and then about an hour of weights. I've lost 10 pounds from the scale, inches from my thighs, stomach, man boobs and turkey neck underarms. Yes, I've got a long, long way to go, but it's certainly made a difference. I've dieted, I've had surgery, I've changed what I eat, none of that had the same effects as lifting heaving things repeatedly. And I feel better. The positive influence it has had on my depression is rather amazing. Mentally I feel better than I have in years, even when I was medicated.